Central to Passover is one of the most cherished traditions of Jewish culture: storytelling. As we prepare to set the Seder table and recount pivotal moments of long ago, our office is overflowing with the remarkable stories of a more recent vintage. Last month, we received an astounding number of grant applications to our documentary filmmaking and theatre programs, all of which explore aspects of Jewish experience. For nearly fifty years, the Foundation has been a vibrant catalyst for the expression for Jewish culture, and our support of creative individuals feels particularly resonant at this time.

On June 12th, the Foundation will continue its celebration of creative life with the 2008 Jewish Cultural Achievement Awards (JCAAs). The benefit evening will honor Ohad Naharin, Artistic Director of Batsheva Dance Company, and Dr. Barbara Kirshenblatt-Gimblett, Professor of Performance Studies at NYU's Tisch School of the Arts and Head of the exhibition development team for the Museum of the History of Polish Jews in Warsaw, Poland. A Special Citation for Service will be presented to Macy B. Hart, Past Chair of the Council of American Jewish Museums. Performances by three Six Points Fellows* - whose exciting work you've read about in past E-news - will punctuate the awards ceremony.

See our special bulletin below to learn how you can join our growing and notable group of supporters at the Center for Jewish History for what promises to be an unforgettable evening.

The Foundation for Jewish Culture welcomes Andrew Horwitz to our staff as Director of External Relations.

Andrew spent many years as an independent writer, performer and producer before becoming a full-time arts administrator in 2002. From 2002-2007 he worked at Performance Space 122, first as marketing director and then as producer, and has worked as a consultant with small theaters and independent artists. He teaches workshops on press, marketing and career development at the artist service organization The Field. He has served on many panels including the The Six Points Fellowship, HERE Arts Center's Resident Artist program, and LMCC's Swing Space program. He has been an adviser to the Carol Tambor Foundation's Best of Edinburgh Award and is co-curator of Prelude08, a festival of innovative theater at the Martin E. Segal Theater Center of the Graduate Center at CUNY. Prior to becoming a full-time arts administrator, Andy worked as an interactive producer at various advertising agencies, most notably Fallon Worldwide. Andrew is a graduate of Northwestern University. He is originally from Baltimore, MD.

As Director of External Relations, Andrew will be working on many exciting initiatives including building a national distribution network for Jewish Culture.

Photo by Meredith Zinner.

SPOTLIGHT ON SIX POINTS

GALEET DARDASHTI

Just last week, Galeet Dardashti gave an exciting preview of her Six Points Project, Voices of Our Mothers: A Middle Eastern Musical Midrash for Today. The founder and leader of the eclectic all-female Mizrahi/Sephardi ensemble Divahn, Galeet pursues her passion for Jewish music as an accomplished singer and anthropologist. Not only has the Six Points Fellowship Program recognized her diverse talents; the Foundation for Jewish Culture awarded her a Doctoral Dissertation Fellowship in Jewish Studies in 2003-2004.

Voices of Our Mothers introduces fresh and provocative compositions that draw inspiration from the musical and cultural landscapes of the Middle East, inhabited by some of the compelling yet under-appreciated Jewish and non-Jewish Biblical women and their descendants. It is an innovative exploration of culture, religion, politics, and gender through the lens of Middle Eastern music.

At Home in Utopia at the Maine Jewish Film FestivalApril 4, panel discussionMaine Jewish Film Festival (also screening grantee films Keep Not Silent and Orthodox Stance) http://www.mjff.org/schedule.html

In 2004, director Michal Goldman received a grant from the Lynn and Jules Kroll Fund in Jewish Documentary Filmmaking toward the completion of At Home in Utopia, about the United Workers Cooperative Colony (the "Coops")--a radical utopian community that grew out of the yearnings and ideals of Jewish secular immigrants in the 1920s. Exploring the history of these buildings over three decades, the film bears witness to lives lived with courage across the barriers of race, nation, language, convention, and sometimes even common sense.

The critics raved, three festivals bestowed Audience Awards for Best Documentary, and a record turnout in Philadelphia has led to an extended run in that city. This documentary by 2005 Film Fund Ilana Trachtman recently won the Association for Americans with Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities (AAIDD) Media Award and was hailed as, "Heartfelt and touching," on ABC News.

Westchester Jewish Film Festivalthrough April 17 *Praying with Lior, April 3 & 6**Blessed is the Match - Special Added Event - May 7*Burns Film Center, Pleasantville, NYwww.burnsfilmcenter.org

Films by two recipients of grants from the Lynn and Jules Kroll Fund for Jewish Documentary Filmmaking - Praying with Lior (2005) andBlessed is the Match (2007) - will be screened at the festival. Q&A sessions and receptions to follow. Sponsored by the American Jewish Committee.

Whole Art Theatre, which received, along with playwright Steve Feffer, a New Jewish Theatre Projects grant in 2007-2008 for Ain't Got No Home, welcomes Feffer back for Bart the Temp, based on Herman Melville's classic Bartleby the Scrivener. Directed by Dann Sytsma.

Director Jason Hutt received a grant from the Lynn and Jules Kroll Fund for Jewish Documentary Filmmaking in 2006 for Orthodox Stance, a portrait of the seemingly incompatible cultures and characters working together to support Dmitriy Salita's rare and remarkable devotion to both Orthodox Judaism and the pursuit of a professional boxing title. In the end, the film is about not only boxing and religion, but a young man's search for meaning in life.

As part of the project Sixty Years of Art in Israel, six major Israeli museums are each presenting artwork from one of the decades of the nation's history. The Israel Museum's exhibition, which presents a comprehensive survey of Israeli art from the past ten years, includes pieces by some forty artists working in the mediums of painting, sculpture, photography, video, and installation.

Judd Ehrlich received a grant from the Lynn and Jules Kroll Fund for Jewish Documentary Filmmaking in 2000 for Mayor of the WestSide, about Mark Puddington, a Jewish teenager with multiple disabilities, known on the Upper West Side as "the Mayor". In Run for Your Life, Erlich focuses on the relentlessly ambitious and endlessly quirky founder of the New York City Marathon, Fred Lebow.

An unprecedented collaboration between three cultural visionaries--David Krakauer, champion of klezmer music and world-class chamber clarinetist; funk legend Fred Wesley, celebrated for his work with James Brown; and hip-hop renegade and beat architect Socalled--Abraham, Inc. heralds a time when boundaries are eroding, mutual respect is presumed, and musical traditions can hit with full force without concession or appropriation. Abraham, Inc. is a head-on musical collision, one that signifies new possibilities for cross-cultural respect and engagement.

Poignant, often witty and exceedingly cinematic, the award-winning Jellyfish tells the story of three very different Tel Aviv women whose intersecting stories weave an unlikely portrait of modern Israeli life.

A conference to engage professionals, community leaders, activists, advocates, agency executives, educators and case workers incultivating practices, tools, and resources for fighting hate crimes in their work and daily lives

Honoring Israel's sixtieth year of independence, this exhibition presents a panorama of images of Israeli women and girls. Displaying more than thirty journalistic and documentary photographs taken since the nascent years of the Jewish state, the exhibition portrays the distinctive femininity that has evolved with modern Israel.

Re-envisioning Difference: Notes from the Forefront of Culturally Specific Museums

In conjunction with Spertus Museum's inaugural exhibition The New Authentics: Artists of the Post-Jewish Generation, Robin Cembalest, executive editor of ARTnews and an award-winning investigative reporter, moderates a panel discussion exploring the challenges and missions of culturally specific art museums in the 21st century.

In recent years Israeli cinema has flourished, receiving critical acclaim both at home and abroad, and winning the hearts and minds of audiences worldwide. At this important juncture, the UK Jewish Film Festival is dedicating a special program to Israeli cinema, presenting the old and the new, the popular and the cutting edge side by side, offering a stage and a context for the growing industry of films made in Israel.

Acclaimed musical groups Kitka and Davka come together for this award-winning concert of Old and New Jewish World Music, produced and written by Leonard Merrill Kurz, directed by Ashley James, and edited by Kathryn Golden. From Forest Creatures Entertainment, a fiscal sponsoree of the Foundation for Jewish Culture.

Israel's Meitav Choral Group opens for the acclaimed Joshua Nelson and the Kosher Gospel Singers. Joshua has performed with Mahalia Jackson, Wynton Marsalis, Aretha Franklin and Dizzy Gillespie, among other stellar musicians. The concert will be followed by a dessert reception, where guests can meet the artists.

Copresented by the Foundation's fiscal sponsoree Habitus: A Diaspora Journaland Housing Works Bookstore Café. Join writers P. F. Thomese, György Dragomán, and Yael Hedaya for a reflection on the role of family in their lives and work, and on the challenges of defining a modern approach to the family experience in literature. Introduced by Habituseditor Joshua Ellison.